With technology developing faster than anyone can publish research into its harms, and with children spending hours online each day, we are leaving young people completely unprotected from the tech industry. Designed to be addictive and completely unregulated, how much gold-standard evidence do we need before we act? asks Bernadka Dubicka.
Earlier this year I took part in an IAI debate about social media and addiction, speaking as a child psychiatrist. As happened with Covid-19, and previously with the climate debate, the academic arguments rage on while the research lags far behind the growth of technology. In the years it takes to complete a study, the tech industry will have moved on to the next generation of platforms, apps, and young users. The research is out of date before it has barely started.
How long do we wait for sufficient gold-standard evidence of the harms of tech on children before we act? Ten years? Twenty? In the meantime, do we believe that tech is a force for good for children or a cause of harm? That depends on which camp you stand in. And if you have foot in each camp, this is not a dichotomous argument: We want our kids to benefit from technology but have many valid concerns. Recently the WHO used the precautionary principle to advise against the use of screens for babies and minimal use for toddlers. This was on the basis of emerging evidence for harms, and because the potential harm to development outweighed any benefits.
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